Beef & Pudding To Close Restaurant

OH DEAR.

Documents retrieved from Companies House reveal the group owe creditors more than £4 million

Less than two months after co-founder Paul Newman quit the group comes the announcement that New Moon Pub Company are to wind up restaurant operations at Beef & Pudding on Booth Street.

The news follows the recent liquidation of the North West-based pub and restaurant group, which has also seen sister venues - Casa Matta near Northwich, The Mockingbird Taproom in Chester, and The Bronx bar and 'pizzeterria' in Knutsford - shut down.

Documents retrieved from Companies House reveal that the group – ran by former TV chef David Mooney – owe creditors, including a number of local family-owned suppliers, more than £4 million across four companies (NMPC Ltd, New Moon Pub Company Kelsall, New Moon Pub Company Manchester, and New Moon Pub Company Ltd).

A defiant Mooney has, however, told Confidential that Beef & Pudding will remain open (though just serving booze) under newly established company Carrwood Catering; as will The Old Sessions House in Knutsford, The Old Blind School in Liverpool, The Lord Binning in Kelsall, and The Montgomery in the Wirall.

Beef & Pudding on Booth Street will remain open as a bar

Lancashire-born Mooney – self titled the ‘original celebrity chef’ – cut his teeth in the restaurants of Normandy, France, before taking up jobs in the kitchens of Raymond Blanc and Marco Pierre White.

In the late-eighties Mooney returned to the family business, helping to reinstate The Belle Epoque Brasserie in Knutsford, before a dalliance with TV saw him star in regional cooking show, Food Hunter, as well as appearances on The Hairy Bikers and Granada Reports.

Mooney launched New Moon Pub Company alongside Newman in 2011, going on to open eight bars and restaurants across the North West.

During an interview in May 2016, Mooney revealed that he and Newman had 'never signed any contracts'. All business 'was done on a handshake,' he said, 'and remains so to this day'.

Though Confidential imagines any new suppliers will be demanding more of a guarantee than that in the future.

(Confidential has asked Mr Mooney how long Beef & Pudding will continue as a bar. We are currently awaiting his answer.)

The group has gone into liquidation owing creditors over four million pounds